It was like Christmas...

Oh my goodness gracious I have soooo much catching up to do with you all. First of all I truly hope everyone had a wonderful, peaceful and restful Thanksgiving. Mine was wonderful since 2 of my 3 kids were able to spend the holiday with us. Having our Marine home was awesome, although it wasn't nearly long enough. Now this is the baby of our family and typical of the baby boy, he pretty much has always just signed his name to whatever his brother or sister did as gifts for most of his life and sent me to get most of his girlfriends gifts over the years (Thank goodness for camera phones) so imagine my suprise when he had our Christmas gifts with him that he picked out and purchased HIMSELF !!! It was so sweet...he bought me a beautiful necklace with these beautiful charms with each kids birthstone and , if that wasnt enough, he also got me the dvd of The Christmas Shoes...the 2 of us ALWAYS watched Christmas movies together starting the day after Thanksgiving so it was an extra special, very thoughtful gift ! Oh how I wish he could be here for the whole month of December but he's not even sure if he will be home for Christma which is killing me. He wont know until Dec 23 when he gets back from the field...GRRRR !

It was wonderful to have both my boys at home with us and the inlaws were with us too and we had a wonderful turkey dinner and then played cards and it was just a blast. Thank goodness I had that extra week (wink, wink) or I would never have been ready. I did finally get all those apples cooked down but ran out of time to get them canned so I figured I would send it over to the church along with my turkey and dressing that I was making for the outreach dinner. Well we all sent over our turkey drippings too so they could make gravy. Well imagine my suprise when I went down to the church kitchen after church on Sunday to pick up my dishes and one of the gals asked if I knew what happened with the gravy...One of the gals mistook my giant container of homemade apple sauce for gravy and added the entire tub to the gravy...Oh my goodness...she said it tatsed ok, but I think she waqs just being nice since I thinbk it would have had to have been ruined !!! I felt so badly about it but I cant understand for the life of me how she didnt smell the apples and cinnamon, especially since I sent my drippings in a mason jar !!!!

Well, now I have to tell you about the exciting swap presents I got in Friday's mail. Melissa from over at Libbies Home was my swap partner for Bumble Bee Lane's Christmas in The Cabin swap and oh my goodness, when I opened that box I was BLOWN away...Look at all the packages...

I was literally squeeling with delight ! My son came running upstairs cuz he thought I got hurt...Nah, just doing the happy dance with all my goodies. Melissa really did a fantastic job ...

Look at all these primtastic gems...I was in prim heaven. I have some close ups to show you each thing individually except I forgot to take a picture of the sweet magnetic grocery list with the prim snowman on it, which was great cuz I just used my last list !!!

I collect rolling pins and this little one is a beauty and Melissa made this sweet little wrapper for it too !

I LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this snowman pillow...how cute is he ???? Perfect addition to my snowman collection !

Isnt this grater and candle just divine ? I found the perfect spot...now I just need to get it hung.

Look at how swwet this mason jar is ? Her attention to detail was so sweet and so thoughtrul. I just LOVE it all.

I think this star is my favorite thing...it's just so perfectly prim.

This lovely candle holder has a wonderfully smelling battery candle in it so its perfect for a place with no outlet.

This little grunged candle smells SOOOOO good and isnt that a sweet little braided mat ?

Last but not least, look at all these sweet Christmas distressed tags. Melissa really went all out and I really felt like maybe I needed to send her another package because she really went above and beyond. If you ever get a chance to be her swap partner...well, you will be as blessed as I am...she did all this while grading papers and holding parent teacher conferences. Isnt she wonderful ???? Yes, she is !

Well, I guess thats about all for me. I am so excited to get my decorating all done...the hubs and I are going on Wednesday to get our trees...Hooray ! I love it once the house smells all piney ! Oh and I am committed to getting those Christmas red and wine wools listed this afternoon...in fact I will be adding them right after this post so if you are in need or the BEST Christmas red wools, be sure to check out my wools for sale page.

It's great to be back online and I will be trying to stop by all of YOUR blogs to see what you've been working on...I have to admit that since I had so much to do and wanted to spend every minute I could with our sons, I didnt even so much as check my email until late last night. I am looking forward to hearing from all of you...You gys are just the best and I appreciate those of you who "checked in" to see if I was ok since you hadnt seen any new posts from me...You really are such wonderful friends and I am truly thankful for you.

Ok, I really am going now.

Grace to you,
Margie